SCORE: From Scrolling to Standing Out: How to Build a Personal Brand on Social Media

In this episode of Game Changer's Collective, host Cassi Manner turns the mic on her own playbook, breaking down the exact strategy she used to grow a personal brand with more than 500,000 followers while running Game Changer Marketing Solutions. Pulled from her recent free SCORE webinar, “From Scrolling to Standing Out,” this episode covers how to build an authentic, magnetic presence on social media instead of chasing trends. 

Cassi discusses: 

• Why authenticity beats polish, and how to stay relatable at any size 
• Defining your niche and target audience to grow faster 
• A three-bucket content strategy: education, inspiration, and entertainment 
• Using humor, hooks, and behind-the-scenes storytelling to build engagement 
• Staying consistent so people actually recognize your brand 
• Getting past analysis paralysis and just hitting post 

“Build a personal brand that truly connects,” Cassi says. “Niche down to grow faster and more effectively.” 

Connect with Cassi at: https://gamechangermarketingsolutions.com/

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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cassimanner/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/gamechangermarketingsolutions/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/game-changer-marketing-solutions/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/gamechangermarketingsolutions/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@cassimanner

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to Game Changer Collectives Podcast. I am so excited to share today's episode with you. So today's episode is a little different. I was invited to be a presenter for SCORE. SCORE is the nation's largest network of volunteer business mentors dedicated to helping entrepreneurs start, grow, and sustain their businesses. A wonderful colleague of mine referred me for the program and I gave a talk. So let's get into it. It's all about how to build a personal brand on social media, from scrolling to standing out. Let's get into the episode.

SPEAKER_01 0:34

Hello everyone. Thank you for joining us this evening. Cassie is our presenter tonight. My name is Barry Black from SCORE, and tonight's webinar is From Scrolling to Standing Out, How to Build a Personal Brand on Social Media. Our presenter is Cassie Manner. I will introduce her in a moment. Now, SCORE is a national nonprofit organization, volunteering. And we provide free small business advice to help people who are looking to grow or start a small business. Most of what we do is free confidential business management. That can be done in person, it can be done online like today, or it can be done over the phone or just email. In addition, we provide a wide variety of both local and online business workshops, such as tonight as an event. We do quite a lot of these, so almost every conceivable topic can be covered. We also provide various expertise and templates and tools through the SCORA website. There are over 8,000 SCORE volunteers across the country. We're a resource partner of the U.S. Small Business Administration. And I'd certainly encourage you to hook up with whichever chapter is closest to you. I think it's always helpful to work with managers who understand the business situation in your location. And you can always find your local chapter by going to score.org. Well, let me introduce Cassie. Cassie is a social media influencer with over a half a million followers. And she owns a full service digital marketing marketing agency called Game Changer Marketing Solutions. And she's built her personal brand from the ground up. And she helps entrepreneurs to do the same thing with their business now, both for their business and for themselves. And so she's going to bring real world experience from both sides of the screen as a content creator and as a marketing strategist. So without further ado, let me turn things directly over to Cassie.

SPEAKER_00 2:52

Hi everybody, I'm so excited to be here. Thanks to the intro, Barry. So yes, I'm Cassie Manner. I own Game Changer Marketing Solutions. And I really specialize in building personal brands, but for business owners. So, you know, nowadays everyone's like, oh, are you B2B, B2C? You know, everybody's H to H, human to human, right? We buy from humans, we sell to humans, we want human connection, we want that face-to-face, we want relatability. We don't want AI all day. We want real people, we want real connection, we want to, you know, see their face, hear their voice, feel their energy. And so that's really what I specialize in is helping people package themselves up and present online in a way that attracts the right people to their business so they can build a social following and really just grow their business with a face in front of it rather than just, you know, having a faceless business that people don't feel an emotional connection to. So I'm super excited to get into the presentation. All right. And so what I want to kind of do before we get into everything is just kind of take a second to arrive. So I know that we are all really busy business owners, we're all running around all day. Maybe you just got on this call after a crazy day like I did. And so I want to just take a second to just arrive. So something that I like to do in my free time when I'm not, you know, running my business is I like to free dive. Free diving is when you hold your breath and you dive underwater, you dive through caves, you spearfish, you all kinds of things underwater on a single breath of air from your lungs, no tube, no scuba tank, just your breath. And so I love to do this because it's really a meditative practice, it's great exercise, it's beautiful underwater, and it's just something I really enjoy. I'm also a yogi, so I love to do breath work and meditation. And so mindfulness and just really being at peace, being in touch with my breath is super important to me. So before we get started, I would love to do what's called a breathe up with you. So this is something that I do during yoga class. This is also something that I do during my day-to-day just, you know, to relax before a call. I did it before this session, and I also do it when I'm swimming around in the ocean before I dive. So we are mammals. We have what's called mammalian dive reflex. It's the same reflex that, you know, whales, dolphins, any kind of sea mammal, they all have the same adaptation in their body. We have the same thing. So when we lower our heart rate, our body uses less oxygen. So therefore, we are able to hold our breath under water longer because our blood is not pumping so fast and using all the oxygen. So we're gonna do this breath work really quick. Just take a couple seconds. We're gonna inhale for two seconds, we're gonna hold for two seconds, and then we're gonna exhale for eight to ten. And so when you do this exhale, think about sounding like a snake. You want to go like you're like hissing, because it's gonna help you to extend that exhale for as long as possible. The reason we do this is because when we inhale, our heart rate goes up. When we exhale, our heart rate goes down. So if we can lengthen that exhale, we're gonna drop our heart rate down, we're gonna make ourselves more relaxed, and if we are free diving, we are able to hold our breath longer underwater because we have that lowered heart rate. So let's get together. So we're gonna inhale for two, one, two, we're gonna hold for two, and we're gonna exhale for ten.

SPEAKER_02 6:27

One more time. Inhale, hold for two, exhale for ten. So maybe you feel a little more relaxed from doing that.

SPEAKER_00 6:46

I invite you to take a note, write that down, and you can do this while you're driving, you can do it before your meetings, anytime you break during the day, it's really great to connect to our breath, be present, and just lower our heart rate, get into our bodies a little bit. That all being said, uh, that's a little introduction to my personal brand. So if someone were to ask you about this webinar tomorrow, right, you might recall that not only do I own a marketing agency where I help business owners build personal brands, but you also might recall some things about me as a person and my personal brand. Free dive, I'm into mindfulness, I'm a yogi, I like to share that peace and relaxation with people. And that's something that I like my clients to feel, right? When they work with us, I want them to feel relaxed. I want them to feel like in their body and just that they're being taken care of in more than just a logistical business sense way. I want them to feel like we're really taking care of them and supporting them in their business and like their emotional health. And so if you can build a personal brand where people remember these things about you when you're not on their feed and when you're not in the room talking to them, it's really, really beneficial because you may remember me more and be inclined to work with someone like me more than someone who just gets on and starts, you know, barking sales pitches at you and things like that. And so it's the same thing for your business. If you have two people, but one you attach an emotional connection to, you remember things about them, you know who they are as the person, you see, feel like, trust them, right? You're gonna want to work with that person. And it's because we are such, you know, human, connective beings that we are inclined to connect with people. So I'm gonna go through this presentation now. I encourage you to take pictures of what's gonna be on the screen. Again, this presentation is going to be, you know, recorded and posted so you can watch it over. But feel free to pull your phone out and take screenshots because we're gonna do a little bit of like workshop together. We're gonna talk through what really makes you you, what makes your personal brand and the kind of things that you will want to pull in together when you're building your personal brand. So we're gonna go through all of this together. Um, if you have a a paper and pencil, pen, or if you want to use your phone or your computer, we're gonna be doing some questions. Uh and so I do encourage you to, you know, participate and write down the responses to them because these are gonna be kind of the building block for your personal brand. So, what is a personal brand? So we talked about a little bit already. It's how people perceive you when you're not in the room, on their feed, in front of them, right? So it's the idea that people have about you. If you think of maybe your favorite celebrities, I'm sure you don't just think of, you know, them in that one movie, the actor they played, or when you saw them in concert, you might think about things that they've also done in their life, things you've seen on their social media, causes they're a part of, things like that. That's all part of their personal brand. And so we want to do the same thing for you. Um, as a business owner, you want people to know you, you want them to relate to you. Um, and this is coming from a really authentic place, right? So this is not like us trying to trick people or come off a certain way or something different than we are. It's really being authentic and real and sharing who you are because people can smell that from a mile away, right? They want real, they want authentic, they want raw, and social media is the place to really share that. There's so many people who have become very well known on social media from just pulling their cell phone out in their car, nothing fancy, no like big production. You don't need to hire a videographer, you don't need a photographer, you don't need like a perfect background when you're walking around, you know, on the job, getting in your car, when you're in your office, just anywhere that is just you, your home, sharing your family, anything like that, just real raw, don't overthink it. All content is good content. That's what we always tell our clients. We're like, send us the content, don't think about it. Our job is to kind of edit it and you know, do all that, but you can do that yourself too, right? So you create this content and then you just make some edits to it later. You add some maybe some text on screen to tell people what's going on, and we're gonna get into all of that. But just the main thing is just don't overthink it. So your story, values, expertise, personality, we want to express all of that. If you love going to the same coffee shop, you know, all the time, take some content of yourself at the coffee shop. Pull out your phone and record yourself, grabbing your coffee and walking out, put it on your story and tag the coffee shop. They're probably gonna post it on their story and you can grow in your local community that way. So again, it's not about being famous and it's not about you know presenting yourself in a way that is not authentic. We want to be super authentic, super real, super raw. Um, and that's gonna attract your people, right? Your vibe attracts your tribe. So that's what we're all about here. So we're gonna do a couple questions here to get things going. So grab out paper, pen, laptop, whatever you want to write on. When someone visits your Instagram or LinkedIn, right, if you have one, or if you don't have one and you're thinking about starting one or you don't know where to start, just what impression do they get from your current, right? Or if you don't have one yet, what impression do you want them to get? So just write a couple notes down. When someone goes to your Instagram, LinkedIn, even your Facebook page, your Facebook profile, wherever you share online, what impressions do they get in the first three seconds? What do they see? What do they feel? Um, what are they gonna kind of just perceive about you? And again, if you don't have one set up yet, that's okay. What do you want that to be? Okay. What three words describe how you want people to feel when they see your content? So when they're scrolling and your face comes up on their feed, what do you want them to feel? For me, I want people to feel really just kind of chill and like, okay, like my life's gonna get better from seeing this content. I always say, like, that's my mission is just to make people's lives better from coming in contact with me. If we have been a bump into each other throughout this lifetime, I hope that I leave a positive impression and that I helped in some way. And so that's how I want people to feel when they see my content. I want them to be like, oh, that was uplifting, that was positive, that made me feel good, that was helpful, that was educational. So, what three words describe how you want people to feel when they see your content? Okay. And then who is someone you admire online and what about their brand resonates with you? So this doesn't have to be, you know, a business colleague or someone that's in your field. This could be totally the other end of the spectrum. This could be an artist, this could be, you know, someone who posts themselves playing video games, like anyone that you admire online, what about their brand resonates with you? And then you can take that one step further. And why is that important to you? So, whatever about their brand resonates with you, what kind of emotional connection do you feel to that? So, if someone on you admire online is a celebrity who does really good charity work, right? Why does that resonate with you? Because that's gonna help you to kind of get more to the core of your emotional connection and your your why. And something I like to do as well. Um, this is kind of a fourth question that I guess we can add in. Um and you can do this later on your own. This will be a little bit of a deeper question. Um, but figuring out your why for why you are in your business, why you do what you do. So you'll write down number one, why do I do this? What is my drive? What is my omission? What is my why? Is it my kids? Is it the life you want for yourself? Whatever it is, write that down and then ask yourself, why is that important to me? And then that's number two. And then you ask yourself, why is that important to me? And then that's number three. And it's called the seven levels deep tool. And so you're gonna ask yourself seven times. So draw seven lines, right? Why is the first one? Why is my business important to me? Why did I start this business? What's your why? And then ask yourself, why is that important to me? All the way down to your seven levels deep. That seventh one, I've done this with people many times and they've cried. They've literally been broke down crying, like, I don't even know you, I'm so sorry. And I'm like, it's okay, this tool just does this to people. So I really encourage you in your own, you know, private time later, do that with yourself because that why is going to help you to nail down your personal brand and help you to nail down, you know, why you're doing this and what do you really want to give to the world through your social media? Because it is a really cool way to be able to touch and connect with as many people as you can on an easy scale. Maybe without even leaving your office or your home, you can kind of just connect with people virtually. It's it's really cool. All right, so we've got all our questions down. Thanks for doing that. Okay, so now we've got a little bit of a start here. So we're gonna define your niche and your ideal audience. So the everybody always says like the riches are in the niches. Trying to talk to everyone means you connect with no one. So people say you earn the right to go broad, right? So you start really, really niche, and then you kind of as you gain that momentum, then you start sharing about more things because people now know, like, and trust you, and it's your social media, your personal brand, you can start sharing more of that. But in the beginning, we really want to niche down because it is just so powerful when people can go to your page and know exactly what they're going to get when they go to your page. So if every time they go to your page, it's a different thing. It's the gym and then it's work and then it's art and then it's this, they're like, whoa, like it's different every time. I don't know what to expect when I come here. And it's hard to build a loyal following that way. After a lot of time, if people start following you for, you know, carpentry tips that you put up and they know, okay, when I come here, I'm gonna see Carpentry, and they follow you, but then they're like, I really like Jim, you know, like I watch his videos, he's funny, and then you start posting about, you know, music a little bit on the side. Well, they already kind of like you, know you, and then they're okay with you introducing more topics. You kind of earn that right to go broad. But in the beginning, we want to keep it super niche, really, really specific, because it's just gonna build that following faster. It's gonna work better with the algorithm, it's gonna work better with your captions, the hashtags, the keywords, the actual content itself. So the social media platforms are getting very good at figuring out what your content is about. It used to be all about the hashtags, right? That was kind of the first thing. It was just like hashtags told people what was in the content. But then the platforms got better. And then they started to be able to pick up what is in the caption. So what is all written in the caption in addition to the hashtags? Now they have software where they're able to register what you're talking about in the video, what's in the video. So if you're talking about flowers, but you have a video of guitars, they're picking up on all of that, and that's gonna kind of affect where you're showing up. So they want to know exactly what your content is about so they can show it to the right people. And so we wanna make sure that it's consistent from the creative content, so the photo, the video, to the captions to the hashtags. We want all that to be consistent because that's if that's all in line, it's gonna get boosted way more to the right people. And then same thing with your page. If you're posting that same content, that same style under those same three to five, we say pillars, but they're basically categories. We'll talk a little more about that. But posting underneath those three to five main pillars, right? So think of like a big building. Your building is the personal brand, right? It's you, and these pillars are what holds it up, right? So say I have three to five pillars. Mine would be like yoga, free diving, um, just kind of like general positivity, business, marketing, right? Those are my kind of things that I share about all the time where I'm living a healthy life, and then I'm also, you know, sharing about how to do that online, and then I'm helping people to build their businesses as well. So they know what to expect when they come to my page. They know that it's mostly going to be about, you know, sharing tips and tricks, personal development, things like that. So know your audience, their ages, their interests, pain points, goals, what they scroll for, what keeps them up at night, what are they thinking about, what is a question that they want answered, what is something that, you know, they keeps them up at night. It really just keeps them up. They're thinking about it. When you speak about it, they're like, yes, this is for me. They are talking to me, right? That's what you want your people to think about and say is they are speaking to me right now. They know my problem, and they are speaking to it. So it doesn't mean that you can't talk about other things, which is we want to have that clear home base where we're consistently showing up and talking to our person all the time. So the formula is your expertise plus your audience plus the transformation you offer. That's your niche. And so we'll go through a little bit more on these questions on how to build this together. So, who are you talking to? So I help blank, right? You write this down, do or achieve blank so they can blank. So for me, it's I help business owners build a personal brand online so they can sell and market their services to the right people in an effective way. So I help blank do, achieve, build, blank, so they can blank. Okay, three to five topics you could talk about for hours and never get bored. So again, I gave you my three to five pillars. So for you guys, write down your three to five and take a second for this. Really, really think about it. What's something that you could talk about for hours and never get bored? So if you have a uh certain local service-based industry business, so say you are a plumber, right? You can talk to people about what's due in the winter so your pipes don't freeze. You can talk about ways to, you know, keep up your house and things to watch out for, prevent measures. You can talk about testimonials or specific case studies of, oh, this happened. I went in and did this, and I recommended this person did this as maintenance moving forward. So think about something that you can go on and on about in your business. I'm sure there are lots of things, but three to five main topics that you could talk about for hours and not get bored. And these are probably gonna be things that you find yourself talking about in your business already, or that you find yourself talking about to your friends, or when you're on sales calls, or when you're meeting with investors, anything that you find yourself really talking about a lot, these are gonna be the things that kind of roll off the tongue and are super easy for you. So now describe your ideal follower or client. So around what age are they, or maybe you don't have an age group and it's everybody, or it's you know, 25 plus, but just as specifically as you can. Again, what keeps them up at night, what they're hoping to find, the problem they are trying to solve. So if you're I have uh some clients who are like lenders, right? They do like hard money lending. So if someone who wants to get into real estate, it's real estate agents, it are people. That already have real estate portfolios and they're looking for their next flip, they're looking for their next buy, they're, you know, trying to figure all these things out. And so they put out that educational content speaking to all these things so that they become a resource for their target follower. They come there to consume the content so they can learn about these things. And then of course, they're also there to lend them the actual money and lead them through the process. So you want to be educating the people that you would be targeting as a client from a really kind of just helpful education-based, value-based perspective where you're not selling all the time. You're not mentioning your brand every single time or always having like a really super strong call to action. You know, we can put that like lower in the comment or in the caption, but or even the comment section, you know, if someone comments, you can write back to them, oh yeah, well, if you're interested in some help, feel free to visit our website. But we wanted to really lead with that engaging value educational style content because over time, when people follow you and come to you for those things, they see they like, they trust you, when they have a need for that, or if they have one now, you're going to be their first choice because it's like the rule of reciprocity, right? You've been giving them something without asking for anything in return. You've been just sharing helpful content. That's how they found you online, that's why they're getting to know you. That's why they're following along with your journey. And then when that they or a colleague, friend, family needs what you offer, you're gonna be the first person that they go to because they feel like they already know you. They resonate with you, they have an emotional connection. So that's what we're trying to build in that space. So I have, you know, clients that are VPs at really big companies like, you know, Oracle and things like that. And they are not necessarily closing a client or, you know, getting a new job offer every day. They already have their position, but they are sharing all this content throughout their week, what's going on with them, because it helps them to get promotions, it helps them to get speaking opportunities, it helps them to get consulting jobs, but they don't have like a direct call to action, like go to my website and purchase this thing right now. I have lots of clients that do have that. Like, for example, I have a bunch of real estate clients, they're building their personal brands around what to do in the area, you know, what is a reason to move to the area, benefits of living in the area, five things to know before you move there. Don't make this mistake. So they're sharing about, you know, what they do without always trying to convert it in that moment. And then over time it just snowballs and you just become known as that personal brand, that person to go to for whatever you know it is that you're offering or selling. And so lastly, we're gonna write down the one transformation people should walk away with after consuming your content. So they go to your page, they're following along. When they consume with your content, what's the end result? What do you want them to feel? What do you want them to be able to do? What should they walk away with as kind of their perception of you from interacting with you through that piece of content? All right, so content strategy and brand voice. So every piece of content fits one of these three buckets. We've kind of touched on this a little bit already, but educate, right? So it's going to be tips, how-tos, teach something your audience needs to know. So say you have a car garage, right? And you fix cars or you do body work or whatever it is, sharing products that people can use at home, right? Or sharing uh ways to keep up with your vehicle or routine or maintenance things you should be doing. Say you have a ceramic car coating business, right? You get the car ceramic coated, but then you need upkeep. You can't just do it once and then never touch it again. They recommend, you know, every one to three months that you get kind of a maintenance done. And then every year you get a bigger maintenance done on it. So putting out that content. So showing before and afters of the cars that were done, the before and then after they're all shiny and clean, but then taking it a step further and educating about what products to use. You know, don't take it through a regular car wash that's gonna scratch up the ceramic. Give this higher level tips, tricks, value about, you know, the services. And that's gonna get them to continue to follow along with you because they're not just, oh, okay, you know, I had my purchase, I'm done. They want to continue to follow you so that they can gain more of that, you know, information about the brand, about you, about, you know, how to improve their life through education and inspire. This is our second one. So motivation story, mindset shifts that move people forward. So similar to how celebrities, you know, you associate them with maybe charities that they do or something that they're doing in other countries or big projects they're working on. And they're also giving really inspirational ideas about how people can do the same thing. There's some like DJs that after their show, you know, they take five minutes and they give a speech about never quitting on your dreams. And they're doing that to like thousands and thousands of people, and they're building that personal brand, not just as a DJ, but someone that people relate to and say, oh, okay, this person cares about me. This person wants to see me succeed, they want to see me win, and they attach those emotional connections and then they don't just go home, never see that DJ again. They follow them on social media because they want more content from them. So, same thing with you know what you guys are doing in any kind of service industry. I have a lot of attorney clients, right? A lot of personal injury, and so we don't just post for the firm itself. We often have personal brand accounts for the attorney where we're sharing them, taking a video, getting out of their car, saying, you know, this is one of the boring parts of the job. I have to go into the bank and, you know, pick up or drop off checks for my client, but it's really rewarding because I know that we're getting them the settlement and, you know, da-da-da-da-da. And they are explaining what they do through their everyday life. And so we want people to feel like they're getting a peek behind the curtain, a behind-the-scenes look of what your day-to-day life is like, the life of you as a business owner that they're interested in working with, and just what really is something that lights you up about your business, sharing that throughout the day, because that's going to get people to really resonate with you and just gives that extra layer of human connection. And then for our third point, entertain. So personality, humor, behind the scenes, relatable moments. Humor works super well on social media. You've probably seen this before all over your feed. People love pop culture jokes, they love stuff from the office, they like anything that's kind of like shit's creek, like those TV shows that everybody knows. So if you can weave stuff like that in, it really resonates with people and it works well for that top of funnel content. So we kind of attract with that funny, relatable, silly stuff that doesn't feel so serious, right? On social media, we have really short attention spans. We don't want to read paragraphs and paragraphs and paragraphs. We don't want really dense information. We want, you know, easy, quick attention-grabbing content. And so if you can figure out how to lean into that, it works really well. I had a public adjustment company, and the one of the main sales guys, he would do these green screen videos where he was like underwater, and that would be his hook video. So you'd be scrolling on social media and you'd see somebody like up to their eyeballs in water. So it's that shock factor. It's like, what? And then, you know, and then he starts talking about flood insurance and what happens if you have it or don't have it, and you know, when if you are getting flood insurance or buying a house, what to look out for. But just kind of leading with that humor, we all like to laugh, we all like to have fun. And so if we can pull that in and just make that something that people are thinking of us with and just grabbing our attention before you get into the nitty-gritty of talking about your services. And I'm sure what a lot of you guys do is, you know, really complicated and it takes a lot of explaining and a lot of selling, and there's so much value in education. But if you can come up with a strong hook in those first three seconds that's humor or silly or sharing something that maybe is a little vulnerable, it just works really, really well on social media. So I do encourage you to try that out. And as you're kind of going through making your first pieces of content or continuing to make content, don't second guess it. Don't feel like it has to be so serious all the time. We can have fun with it. We're all people, we all like to laugh, we all like funny movies. And so, yes, if what you're doing is, you know, a very intense, serious thing. I have a lot of doctors and nurse practitioners that are psychiatrists that are, you know, my clients that I do these personal branding building for. And we want to keep it professional always. We want to make sure that people know they're gonna receive a high level of service when they work with us 100%. But if we can break up that noise, make it a little fun, a little silly, lead with something that's attention-grabbing and relatable, it it really speaks volumes and it gets people to again know like, trust, and relate to you faster than if we're just, you know, screaming into the void, just marketing sales jargon all day. Um, so yeah, hooks are everything. You have one to two seconds to earn the scroll stop to get people to stop. So think about if you're scrolling and you just see something that's like, hey guys, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, right? That's not gonna grab as much as if you're like, wait, stop. Like, what if you started a video that was like, wait, stop, and then people are gonna be like, wait, what? And they stop and then you talk. It just you have to grab them those first two seconds. So you you can do things where you're filming and then you kind of flip the camera around really fast to you or what you're working on, some kind of just something to break up the feed that's not just like a stationary face or a stationary video. Also, text on screen. We want to tell people what the video is about. We want them to watch right away. That's why those captions you may have seen before, they're like POV, that's point of view. So it'll say, like, POV, you just hired us as your legal team. And then it's showing videos of you know, the legal team working with people and closing deals or whatever it is. So putting people in that mindset of what's going to happen when I work with you in a way that gets them to stop what they're doing and pay attention to you, that is the goal. And then again, we already said this, but all content is good content. So we want to repurpose everything and shoot as much content as possible. And you can use it in, you know, different ways. You can use it in one way on your story, you can use it another way for a reel, you can use it as a story. Um, like that is kind of telling the caption of what's what's happening. So one time I was shooting for a client, they have a beach company, it's called the California Beach Co. And they supply all these really great kids' play pens and overhead tents and things like that. We're shooting at the beach, and their whole thing is that you know, umbrellas are really stressful, and so to have to deal with an umbrella at the beach, you've got your kids there, you know, the umbrellas blow away and everything. There was a dad trying to set up an umbrella, and it was blowing upside down, flipping over. The wife and the kids are underneath the trees, like hiding from the sun. And so we asked him, we were like, Can we record you, like trying to set it up? And then can we give you one of these tents? Can we gift this to you and then just show you guys enjoying it? And he was like, Oh my god, please. And so we filmed this guy really trying to set up his umbrella and failing at it, and then switched it into okay, we gifted him one of these tents, and they're able to enjoy that throughout the whole day. And like that was just such valuable content. It was so real, it was so raw. It told the story, it was what was really happening out in the world, and we got real people to know, like, and trust us and the brand by just being a human and asking if we could help someone who was having a hard time. So, the more that you can capture that throughout the day, I'm sure you guys all help your clients in a million ways throughout the week. And the more you can share that and just can capture that, the the better. Some clients will also be open to doing like video testimonials with you. So don't be afraid to be like, hey, can I take a quick video view or even like selfie video both of you together? Like, hey, um, you know, we provide roadside assistance, and this one of our clients, we just helped him out with whatever was going on with his car, and then he's just like, Yeah, like they're a godsend, you know, I don't know what I would do without them. Just getting that kind of real raw content captured and then sharing it on your personal brand and sharing it on your business page is so valuable because it really shows the faces behind it and it shows the solutions that you guys give on a day-to-day basis that otherwise people have no way to see unless you're, you know, sharing it online. So we want to aim for this balance. We want it to be mostly value, education, inspire, motivate, right? A little bit of the personality behind the scenes, um, about 25% of that. And then only 15% of it we want to be like marketing, promotion, soft selling. We don't want it to be super heavily focused. You guys have probably seen when you go to a brand page or a business owner's page and it's just all like graphics and commercial, and it's just, it's like, I don't want to follow this. Like, I get enough billboards and commercials and advertisements in my day-to-day. But when you go there and you see their face and you see their dog and you see their kids and you see, you know, what they're doing in their day-to-day, and a testimonial for one of their clients that they helped, there's so much to click on and to explore, and you're like, oh, I want to see what else is gonna come out from them. That's that's like really why we want to have this split, is because we want it to be mostly 60% value education, tips, tricks, what's in it for me. That's what people are always asking themselves, especially with their attention, especially on social media. What am I gonna get out of this? What's in it for me? What is this gonna do for me? And so we want to tell them right away. We want to tell them in the bio, right? So on mine, I think it says on my Instagram, like I help brands create stellar content, something like that. Like it tells them immediately what I do. And then the personality behind the scenes, we want to show that. And of course, it's going to coincide with what you do in your business, but it's going to show you. It's going to show what you're doing in your day-to-day. It's going to show if you're, you know, running to the Home Depot because you had to fix something at your restaurant yourself and just showing the craziness of what it's like to own a restaurant. But people are like, oh wow, like that guy's really hustling to keep this shop open for us. Like, I want to go to the restaurant. So showing that behind the scenes, showing the personality, showing your team, right? Sometimes people only interact with the salesperson or with the owner. We want them to know the people behind the scenes, the people that are making it happen. So if you've got an auto body shop, show a video of your guys working, show them smiling, show them on their lunch break, show anything that shows what is really happening and the people that touch the project along the way, because that's what people want to see. They want to know what's going on. They want to really relate to you and your brand and the people who make everything happen. So outside of this, you don't want to share too much. You want to keep it really specific and toned into these things because, from a personal branding perspective, when you're trying to really be professional online, we want it to kind of fall into one of these three buckets. We don't want to go too far outside of this. We want to keep it consistent in the look, color, fonts, visual aesthetics, because this builds recognition, right? We want the fonts and the graphics and everything that you're using to coincide with your website, with your logo, so that when people see it before they even read anything, before they read the logo name, we want them to know it's your brand right away. Out of the gate, no questions asked. There's brand recognition immediately. I don't tell you guys about branding, you know about this, but make sure that it shows up on your personal brand as well because you are the face of your brand, and we want people to connect you as the business owner with the brand. So keeping it consistent throughout. And again, analysis foralysis is why most personal brands never get off the ground. So just post it. Even if you feel like maybe it's not perfect, it's not polished, it's too raw. I don't like how my face looks on video. Do it anyways. People don't care. We're our own biggest self-critic. And most people are not gonna notice any of the things that we're, you know, self-critical about. So just post it, get it out there, get started, and that's how you're gonna build a personal brand. We can't do it without showing ourselves. So this is just a way to get started. Again, I always want to give action steps and want you to know exactly what to do moving forward. So you could do, for example, Monday value post, beginning of the week, right? So kind of lead with that tip that how to the educational people are in that headspace Wednesday, you know, middle of the week, do personality behind the scenes. If you had any sales calls on Monday or Tuesday, you know, talk about what it was about, the the client that you're gonna solve a problem for. You don't have to go really specific, but you can say I met with a potential client on Monday, and I thought that this was something really cool to share because this is a problem I see a lot of people in my industry have. Um, and we talked through some solutions. So I just wanted to share three things that that person could do right now that are free. They didn't even have to hire me. I just shared these three things, so I'm gonna share them with you guys as well, right? Stuff like that. Just kind of get into what's going on with you, your business, and how you help people. And then on Friday, you could do a reel, it could be like with a trending audio or storytelling. It could take people through your day, your week. It could show just your boots walking on the ground. And I could say, like, we're always showing up, you know, 10 minutes early to our client meetings because we we know your time is valuable. Just something little like that tells people, okay, these guys are gonna show up, they're gonna show up on time, they're gonna be early, they know my time is valuable. Really easy stuff like that doesn't have to be super polished. The algorithm rewards you for showing up and slow and steady beats sprint and disappear. So I would rather have you posting three times a week than post every single day for two weeks and then like you feel like you didn't move mountains and you know go viral and so you quit. So the algorithms really reward you for being on there consistently and showing up as a user because they want to know that if they send people to your platform, to your posts, that you are going to continue to post. You're not just gonna ghost these people. They want to present pages that are going to put out good content for a long time so that then when they put you on the Explore page or on the for you page and they push your page to their users, you're gonna be a person that's sharing consistently. So don't quit too early. It snowballs, but like it takes time. I always tell people give yourself three to six months to really start to gain traction on social media. That's not saying that you can't start bringing in sales inside of the first month, second month, third month, but it takes time. It took me a really, really long time, like 10 plus years to build a following. It takes a lot of time, it takes a lot of showing up, and not every post is gonna perform well. Some posts are gonna perform terribly, and then some posts are gonna get like thousands of views, and we don't always know with the algorithm. So it's something that we want to continue to put out and continue to market ourselves consistently because consumers are getting really smart. So even if you're not getting a million people, you know, following you and engaging with your content, that's not to say that your potential clients aren't going from your website or going from your email marketing and going to look at your social media. They are. They're doing brand research on you. I'm sure before you maybe book a hotel, a resort, uh, or even a restaurant, right, for dinner. You're gonna go to their Instagram and you're gonna look and see what it looks like. You're gonna tap on their story because you know that that was put up in the last 24 hours and you want to see what's going on at their location right now. I always do that when I'm booking resorts. I go to their social media, I want to see what people are posting and tagging there. I want to see what it actually looks like rather than just a super hyper polished website because that's not always the real raw experience. So websites like that really, really polished Instagram, TikTok is gonna be more of that day-to-day, what's going on there. Um and so it's the same thing with your personal brand. Okay, workshop, couple questions. So we're gonna be super honest here. So, what has held you back from posting consistently in the past? And then what day and time could you realistically batch content to create for the whole week? So, this is if you're gonna do some video content, maybe you know that Tuesday afternoons are pretty slow for you. That's the day that you batch create a bunch of content. You wipe your phone camera off, you place it in front of a window, or you do it in your car. The car is a great place to film. It's quiet, there's good lighting. There's also something about car content that makes people just stop their scroll because it's like, why are they in the car? They need to talk right now. Are they going somewhere? Did they come from somewhere? Like, what's so urgent about it? I'm sure you guys have watched content of people talking to their phones in their car. There's a personal injury attorney, his name is Jefferson Fisher. He got very, very famous. He's like millions of followers. He's on podcasts all the time, and he started literally just taking. Videos in his car, super like unprofessional, just talking to his phone and no edits, no fancy team videographer, anything. And he's like incredibly, incredibly famous now and gets, you know, obviously speaking gigs and clients and all of these things just from straight videos in his car. So don't underestimate the shooting in the car because it works well. Okay. And then what is one collaboration or partnership that can make sense for your brand right now? So is there a local coffee shop that you'd like to do a collaboration with? Is there another business that kind of isn't a competitor but kind of complements yours? You guys could do a giveaway together, right? You could put both posts social media content saying, follow both of us and comment on this post and it's going to enter you to win a gift card or whatever it is. And so working with other business owners, working with other uh brands in your area, anything like that, because you're cross-promoting between each other's followers. So if they have followers and you have followers and they're not a direct competitor, you complement each other, you can gain followers from each other. And then the algorithms also will just promote you more because you're you're gathering content and followers from more people and more pages. So that's something to think about as well is who can you kind of work with to help grow your personal brand. And then how are you currently engaging with your audience? What could you do more of? So maybe you're not doing it at all and you're gonna start, or maybe you don't really respond to your comments, respond to your DMs. That's something you want to be really on top of, whether it's your personal page or your business page, if people are taking time to write DMs and comments to you, write back to them, right? That's there's a heartbeat on the other side of that screen. That's someone who could be a potential client, a potential team member. So if that's not something that you're you know doing right now, definitely dive into engaging with your audience because the algorithms really promote brands and people that are engaging on the platform. So these are user-based platforms. They want to see you on there being a user, commenting, liking, scrolling, following. So spending that time on there, being a part of the community is going to be really helpful for the algorithm to push your content. So don't underestimate the power of being a part of the community. Rather than just scrolling and, you know, not interacting, try to react online to people and respond to them. Okay, so your next seven days. Again, you guys can take a picture of this. So rewrite your bio. So when people go to your bio and they see what shows up underneath your username, tell them who do you help, what do you do, why it matters. We want to share this stuff and tell them right there when they get there. Don't make them have to search for it. Think of it like on your homepage, your website, right when they get there. That top one-third should tell them exactly what you do, the problem that you solve. So do that in your bio, rework your bio a little bit and write it in a way that's like, if I read this, would this make me want to follow this page or read more? And then choose your three content pillars. Again, it can be three to five, but if you start with three, it's a little more specific and helps you to kind of niche down. But write them down somewhere visible. So if you want to put it on a post-it note in your office, on your desk, in your bathroom mirror in the morning, write down kind of those three to five things that make you you that you're gonna create content around. So you start your day with that intention of, I'm gonna try to get some content throughout my day sharing this. And then post one piece of content that reflects your brand voice, just post it, right? So one of those three to five pillars, choose some content under it, post it, see what happens. I guarantee you're probably gonna get a better response than you think. Audit your feed. Does it look visually reflect your brand that you described today? Does it reflect that? Or is it maybe too commercial? Is there too many graphics? Is it all different colors? Does it not match? Don't be scared to delete stuff. Feel free to go through and kind of clean it up a little bit, archive some posts so it looks nice. We want it to look really presentable. We don't want everything to be, you know, blues, and then there's like a really bright red post because that just kind of throws it off. We want it to be really nice and polished and look aesthetic. And then write a simple weekly content plan with two to three posts to be scheduled. Um, so again, this comes down to your pillars. Pick something Monday, Wednesday, Friday. I'm gonna share tips and tricks. I'm gonna share a behind the scenes of my team working. And then on you know, Friday, I'm gonna show me going and ordering my favorite coffee at the local coffee shop and shouting them out, something like that. Engage genuinely with one person and your niche. So somebody else that does what you do or potential client, comment on something, DM them, do some sort of you know, positive reach out in your space so that you can kind of start to be a face that people see, hear, feel online. And then optional, but bonus points if you do this, film a 30 to 60 second intro video just for practice. And if you like it, show it to you know a friend or family member. They'll probably encourage you and you can post it. So it could be something like, hey, I'm trying to, you know, share more about my business on social media, tell me what kind of tips and tricks you'd like to see. This is something that you know I share with a lot of my clients, and then share whatever it is. You're gonna get a good response. You are just trust me. All right. So thank you all so much for your time, Shay. This was super fun. Feel free to take a picture again of this screen. You can scan this QR code here. I'm offering a free consult call to anybody on this call just to kind of go through, you know, your personal brand, your pillars, talk about, you know, what could work for you, how you could start sharing content, maybe get some ideas going. But yeah, feel free to take a screenshot of this, take a picture, scan there. It'll take you to my booking page. And yeah, it was such a pleasure. And I really hope that you all just jump in, shoot some content. Doesn't have to be perfect, but just go for it, start posting, and you will get a way better response than you think. I promise. It's it's always so validating. You post it and then people are like, oh my god, I love this. That was great. You should do more of that. So we're our own worst critic and just just go for it, you guys. You got it.

SPEAKER_01 50:04

Thank you so much, Cassie. And thank you to our audience. Much appreciated. I'm hoping I I I know that everybody got a lot of very helpful information, and I hope that they'll they'll be wanting to follow you, add to your great list of followers. So, with that, I want to thank everyone, and especially Cassie Manner, for such a wonderful presentation tonight.

SPEAKER_00 50:28

Thanks everyone. Really appreciate it. It was such a pleasure. I I really enjoyed this. I would love to do more of these talks, and I would love to know you know what you guys want to learn more about because it's really such a passion for me, and it can be so, so powerful if you just kind of get out there and start doing it. So, as much as I can encourage you to take that leap, I I'd love to know as what much as I can share with you as possible.

SPEAKER_01 50:50

Thank you all, and I hope you have a good evening. So, again, thank you, Cassie. Thank you to our audience.

SPEAKER_00 50:54

Awesome. Thanks, everyone.

SPEAKER_02 50:55

Thanks, Score.